Looking for computer advice

Hello everyone,

I am looking to purchase a new computer that runs very smoothly with secondlife, my price range is about 1,300 dollars.

The following link is for some dell computers i saw, the $1,300 on the middle right specifically.
http://www.dell.com/content/products/features.aspx/cto_xpsdt_400?c=us&cs=19&l=en&s=dhs

I want the computer to run very well with secondlife especially, and im wonderinf if this would be a good one to buy.

Also, if you have any input or another place to find a computer with similar or better specs for around the price, let me know!

Thanks ,
Cami

Hello Cami,

That dell is a good comp, but it uses shared video memory, which means it is built onto the motherboard, which will slow down SL in all hoinesty.

might I suggest looking at http://www.alienware.com
Or even check out CompUSA
or MicroCenter

Depending on where you live, you might also want to check out a few local computer dealers and makers.

If you're looking to buy a system from a big company, the XPS 400 you're looking at is reasonable enough. (You could do a little better with a fully custom system from a small builder, but you might prefer having a big company behind your system.) But none of the preconfigured systems are quite right for a Second Life computer, so I'll give you some hints on how to set it up.

General hints about buying from Dell: try configuring your system a couple of ways, starting from different base systems. The price doesn't always come out the same! For instance, when I tried it this evening, I could price the system I'm suggesting starting with either the cheap model or the second-most-expensive one; it came out costing less starting with the cheap one. In part, that's because the more expensive one forces you to take XP Professional. But tomorrow it might be different; Dell pricing changes almost daily, and they always have some sort of special offer going on. And get on their email list; they sometimes offer better prices there than you can otherwise get on the web site.

Now, on to what to put in your system:


Processor: any of the choices will work well. Faster is better, but it costs more, so weigh your budget.

Video card: most of the choices they offer aren't great. At your budget, the best bet (of what they offer) is the NVidia 7900GS. The cheap options (NVidia 7300 and ATI X300) aren't very good performers in SL, and the NVidia 6800 is a previous-generation card that won't be fully ready for the future. The ATI X1900 is overpriced (if I were going to spend that much money on a video card, I'd want an NVidia 7950GX2), and too much card for a system at your price level anyway.

RAM: go for 2GB. The stock 1GB is adequate if you're JUST going to run SL, but if you get involved in design and want to run your graphics editor at the same time, you'll want more.

Hard disk: the bigger, more expensive models will do nothing for SL performance if you have enough RAM. Upgrade if you need the space for other purposes; otherwise, don't bother. If you're paranoid about your data, the DataSafe option that Dell is now offering (a software-based RAID 1 setup, in case you're wondering what it really is -- in other words, all your data is stored on two drives with identical contents) is worth considering.

Sound card: don't bother. Add-on sound cards are great for other games, but they do NOTHING for Second Life, which makes no use whatsoever of any sound synthesizer hardware you might have. The sound quality of a good add-on card is slightly better than the motherboard sound interface, but not enough better to justify the expense to play the compressed audio you'll be listening to in SL.

TV tuner: obviously does nothing for Second Life. Buy one if you want it, otherwise forget it.

Physics processor: SL won't use it, and probably never will. Skip it unless you want it for one of the handful of games that will actually use it. You can always buy it separately and install it later, and it will probably be cheaper next year anyway.

Monitor: spend the extra $50 and get the Ultrasharp model with digital interface. Flat panels with analog interface are good, but never look QUITE perfect; with the digital link, they're always spot-on. If you've got the money to spend, upgrading to the 20 inch widescreen is also reasonable.

Speakers: if you just want them for convenience, get the ones that attach to the flat panel. (When you change displays, you also have to switch to a different speaker model.) If you want speakers that actually sound good, you can do better than the ones Dell offers; check your local stores for good speakers, or hook the computer up to your stereo system.

Operating system: Any of the versions of Windows XP will be fine for SL, so you might as well get the cheapest one (which might be either Home or Media Center, according to Dell whim) unless you need XP Professional to connect to an office network.

There are so many choices nowadays. I agree with the person above that says you can go to a small computer shop and get a custom build for cheaper. For SL its the big three:
-Video Card (GPU)
-RAM
-Processor (CPU)

I have been running lots of benchmarks on SL and find that for all of these you want as much as you can get. For RAM 1 gig is required and for CPU 3.2 GHZ seems to be what you want to start with. (But more is better on all of these).

Although some swapping to the harddrive will occur the harddrive is of less importance. The motherboard seems to be a screwy variable here and I dont know what to say as certain chip sets seem to be "anti-Linden" and its a crapshoot on which one is more performance prone.

Someone mentioned Alienware and I havent been to thier site in sometime so I looked. That Aurora 5500 comes in at $1339 when you bump the RAM up to 1GIG. But still I would want to bump the video up to GeForce 7900GT.

Again, that is Alienware so you are paying a premium. To me $1300 is alot of money and with the right dealer you should be able to get very good video, ram and CPU.

Good luck. When you get your PC post the stats here and then tell us what kind of performance you get as the PC performance issue is an ongoing question with SL.

Scott

I like Dell, and have an XPS 400 myself. I would definitely recommend 2GB RAM, and I'm happy with the Pentium D processor. I like LCD monitors because they're easier on my eyes. I have a Samsung 17", but I think the Dell LCD's are very similar.

I just upgraded my computer on Monday and it runs SL very nicely.

I got the Titan865PE at CompUSA along with a 3.0 Ghz P4 hyperthreading chip. The board has an 800 Mhz FSB and I beleive up to 4Gb of RAM capability (overkill in my book)

The graphics car that I bought for it is the GeForce 6600 AGP card with 256Mb ram

The board/CPU combo was $350 and teh graphics card was $150 after the mail in rebate.

Runs SL beautifully.

I'm sure there are much better systems out there butthis worksnicely.